"Lent For Everyone - Luke Year C" (NT Wright)

TITLE: Lent for Everyone: Luke, Year C: A Daily Devotional
AUTHOR: N.T. Wright
PUBLISHER: Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2012, (140 pages).

Today is Ash Wednesday 2013. It is fitting to introduce a book devotional for Lent. NT Wright has based his meditations on the Church liturgical calendars of Years A, B, and C, with meditations on the gospels. Typically, Year A is for Matthew, Year B for Mark, and Year C for Luke. This 3-year cycle than repeats. For most laypersons, it does not really matter which specific year is for which reading. Year C for some Church groups is in 2012. That said, there is nothing to prevent anyone from restricting themselves from meditations on the book of Luke for 2013. After all, it is God's Word.

With daily readings from Ash Wednesday right through to Resurrection Sunday, popular writer and theologian NT Wright provides a series of reflective thoughts and meditations to help readers remember the journey of Christ to the Cross. There is a meditation on a passage of Luke every Monday to Saturday, with specific attention to particular verses. On Sundays, the focus shifts to worship through Psalms. On Easter week, Wright leads readers from Luke 24 to Acts 5, helping us to look back at the critical events of the death and the resurrection of Jesus.

Wright prepares each devotion with a personal translation of the text. The non-inclusion of any specific year or date means that the devotional can be used and re-used any year. He then makes an observation of everyday life before bridging our world to the ancient times. Finally, after explaining the contexts, he helps readers with a Lenten thought for today, with gentle guidance for the readers to pray more, reflect deeper, and to live more contemplatively throughout the Lenten season. Sometimes, he closes with questions for the reader to think about. Other times, he closes with a prayer, a confession, a or on Sundays, he gives an exhortation for the reader. One important consideration for any Lenten reading is that it is not too theologically heavy or intellectually heady. It needs to help readers ease into a more contemplative mood toward a hope for tomorrow. It needs to help us be more aware of our sinfulness, and to be led toward godly sorrow. It needs to be grounded in Scripture and allows readers to sense the Spirit guiding them in their thoughts, their words, and their actions. Known for his theological brilliance, Wright has shown us again that theology is not for theologians in seminaries or Bible schools. Theology is for everyone.

If you want a book for this Season of Lent, I warmly recommend this book for your reading, your praying, and your meditating. Use this book with your Bible or your hymnal. May this season of Lent be one that helps you to pray, to reflect, to think thoughts of Christ, and to remember that while in a way it is our sins that nail Jesus to the Cross, it is the love of God that resurrects Christ from the dead, to give us life.

Rating: 4.75 stars of 5.

conrade

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This book is provided to me free by Westminster John Knox Press and NetGalley without any obligation for a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.